January 26th, 2011

Welcome to our H-Town Showdown series. Our brackets are seeded and the contenders for the title are ready to go. Each Wednesday we’ll present another match-up. There will be four weeks of voting for each competition in each round. So rally up your friends, followers and fans. This will be a true test of attrition.

Seed #1: Pearland Coffee Roasters and Antigua Coffee House
Pearland Coffee Roasters and Antigua Coffee House has been around coming up on a year now (Happy One Year Anniversary on January 27th). If you haven’t been—I’m sorry. They’re roasting fair-trade coffee beans, brewing delicious beverages, and putting the burbs on the map for more than a place of chain establishments. From those inside the loop, to Pearlanders that call themselves regulars, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone with an unkind word towards this thriving local shop.

Seed #8: Shoeshine Charlie’s Big Top
Clowns usually scare the bezeezus out of me. A healthy diet of Pabst Blue Ribbon and live music can usually keep that fear at bay. That’s why Big Top is so perfect. It’s the kind of place that can be anything you’ve ever wanted. It’s a lounge. It’s a music venue. It’s a dive bar. It’s a place to sneak in a game or seven of shuffleboard. The drinks are cheap if you’re drinking the right stuff. The music is always free. The experience is unforgettable. From the dormant bumper car out front to the lit up tribute to Elvis out back.

The Final Jabs
- Pearland Coffee Roasters is in a strip mall. Then again, good luck finding any 20’s style houses out there. They’ve made that shop their own.
- Scared of clowns (or lead paint for that matter), don’t look up when you’re at Big Top
- Antigua Coffee House is far away. About 40 minutes. Distance is relative, by the amount of votes they received, it seems a fair share of you, dear readers, live outside the Loop.
- Pastries, while they’re eat your fingers off delicious— they’re not made in the shop
- You’ll be pressed to find a bar with more elevation changes than Big Top. Step up, step down and do it all again. Better find your balance before you find the bar.
- They used to have a couple working pinball machines at Big Top. Now-a-days it’s all shuffleboard and free foosball. Not a bad thing.